Elective surgery
Mr GUY (Bulleen—Leader of the Opposition) (14:08): My question is to the Minister for Health. Melissa has severe arthritis and requires a total jaw replacement. She is a 42-year-old single mum of two kids, and up until 12 months ago was in full-time work. Twelve months ago she was told the wait for her surgery would be six months. She has now just been told by her doctors that that wait to complete her surgery is three to five years. She is in constant pain, cannot chew or eat properly, has lost weight and suffers from migraines from the pain. She can no longer work. Can the minister please explain to Melissa, who is watching today, why and how her surgery wait time has blown out from six months to three years?
Mr FOLEY (Albert Park—Minister for Health, Minister for Ambulance Services, Minister for Equality) (14:09): Can I thank the Leader of the Opposition for his question. Not being familiar with the particular case that he has raised, I take it as fact that it is an accurate reflection of the circumstances that Melissa is facing. Subject to understanding a bit more detail of the context—public or private patient, the clinical status—subject to those kinds of issues, which clearly I am not in a position to comment on, not being the clinician, what I would say is that subject to all those kinds of issues clinical decisions are made by clinicians.
If in the course of a person being on a category 2 or category 3 list for elective surgery their condition deteriorates, they can upon clinical advice move up—and do move up—to category 1. Category 1 throughout the entire course of the pandemic has continued to be delivered on time. Of course when it comes to the impact of a one-in-100-year event called a global pandemic, which has seen these circumstances of a growth in surgery waiting times and deferred care in Victoria, in New South Wales, in Queensland, in every state and territory of the commonwealth, we have seen these arrangements blow out. But rather than admire the problem, rather than make the problem worse by attacking the workforce, questioning the public health advice and undermining the public health response, what this government does is get on and fix those problems.
Ms Staley: On a point of order, Speaker, the minister is debating the question, and I ask you to bring him back to it.
The SPEAKER: Order! I ask the minister to come back to answering the question.
Mr FOLEY: Rather than act in a way that others would to make the problem worse, what we do is work in partnership. We bring substantial resources to that partnership—a $1.5 billion plan to address this issue in a new way. This new creative way expands the public sector capacity to deal with these issues, brings in a new workforce—a trained workforce, expands the footprint to partner in new ways with the private sector and to bring capacity into this sector from our private partners, and indeed grows the public footprint by establishing models such as the Frankston Private hub, which will be tangibly delivering 9000 if not more public surgeries to public patients to bring the very sort of circumstances that the honourable member refers to back into a position of sustaining a new approach. This is a government that funds the work that we need to do to build our public health system in partnership with the community to get this problem fixed.
Mr GUY (Bulleen—Leader of the Opposition) (14:12): With around 100 000 Victorians in the same boat as Melissa awaiting surgery and the minister refusing to tell Victorians how long it will take to clear this surgery waitlist and unwilling to even reveal how many Victorians are on that waitlist, what confidence should people like Melissa have that they will actually get the surgery they need in a timely manner when the minister refuses to answer such straightforward questions about his portfolio and the health care of thousands of Victorians?
Mr FOLEY (Albert Park—Minister for Health, Minister for Ambulance Services, Minister for Equality) (14:13): I thank the Leader of the Opposition for his supplementary question and just refute the basis of his suggestion that this is a government that is not addressing these issues. The honourable member asked a series of questions, he got a straight answer about them and I would just point to the comments that others have made to point to who is serious about fixing this problem, who is serious about making sure that this once-in-100-year pandemic is dealt with in a way that not just fixes the problem that the pandemic has delivered but builds a new model of care to make sure that we stay on top of it for good—a $1.5 billion investment partnering with the public and private sector, working with our workforce rather than attacking it.
Ms Staley: On a point of order, Speaker, I would just ask you to ask the minister to look at you when he is speaking so that you can actually call the point of order.
The SPEAKER: Order! The minister has concluded his answer.